Carmen Inox Arrives Today!

That looks awesome!!!!

 

congrats!!!!

 

Congrat's .. i've had my eye on Dupray for a long time.... Enjoy!

 

Wow....nice add on to your collection!

 

Thanks guys, keep posted to this thread for more info about the unit. One of the frustrating things for me when researching this machine was the lack of info and pics from actual end users. I will be doing my best to rectify that shortfall.

 

April 20 Update


Things have been really busy, but I am have found a few minutes to update my entry into the steam cleaning world. Read on for a detailed process write up on some interior cleaning work performed in the past few weeks.

Car #1: 2008 VW Jetta GLI
Status: 40,000 miles, but really in good shape overall. I would not say it stretched my new machine anywhere near its limit.
Procedure: Started off working high to low in the car with steam, vacuum and various MF towels.
Glass: Worked it across the glass and then came back and wiped down with an uber glass towel. It came up crystal clear, and I did not need to use any chemical cleaner!
Trim/dashboard/center console: I used medium pressure steam at about 6" away and then wiped with a Costco MF. Following that, I utilized the vacuum feature in tandem with a Swissvax brush to get the remaining bits of dirt and dust. On the door trim pieces, I used the triangle brush and a MF towel. At this point I was pretty excited about how much faster the process was going. Things were coming up clean with minimal effort and time. Plus, I did not use any chemical cleaners. Normally I would have coated the panel in OPT Power Clean 5:1 and scrub with a brush and wipe w/ a MF towel.
Leather Seats: First I worked on vacuuming out the tight areas and seams in the seats. A quick blast of steam, followed by the vacuuming pulled the grime out. After that I pulled out the triangle brush again wrapped with an MF towel and using the medium steam setting worked it relatively quickly over the leather. As you will see in the pictures, it pulled out all kinds of soiling and returned the leather to a nice matte finish. Again, this process took much less time than my usual procedure. Probably saved me in the range of 5-10 minutes per seat.
Carpet: These surfaces in the car were in pretty good shape as I mentioned, but it was nice to use the Carmen's vacuum feature and with the push of a button add steam for any stubborn soiling. I used the upholstery tool on the mats and did follow up with my Meg's static hair brush as the upholstery tool doesn't have any brushes on it.

I finished this car in 2.5 hours and would estimate the Dupray saved me about 1 hour overall. This is huge in terms of overal wear and tear on my body as well as productivity in a day. As I get more familiar with this machine I have no problem believing I will be able to save even more time.


50/50s of the leather, side closest to car door has been steamed


In action

Dirt removed from the leather






Car #2: Chevy Malibu
Now onto a really nasty vehicle, one that had been 'partied in' according to the owner. I had to stop him from describing exactly all of the activities that had taken place or I wouldn't have been able to go through with the detail. :thud:This car was really one of the worst I have ever worked on, with dog hair, dirt, food, sticky stains and beer odor everywhere. I honestly wasn't sure how the new machine would fare on this one.
Procedure: Much the same as the GLI mentioned above, with a few key learnings:
Glass: Adhesive residue from DMV stickers will eventually come off with the Dupray's heat and steam, but a bit of 3M GPAR can speed up the process.
Dash/Trim: Used the Dupray Turbo Lance Steam + Vac to basically melt the food stains and syrupy residues, then wiped up with a MF or vacuumed up in the case of the cupholders. This attachment is basically a narrow profile lance with steam nozzle sitting directly above the vacuum nozzle. Very effective for tight spaces.
Seats/Upholstery: These were absolutely hideous. Stains everywhere and nasty odors. Not to mention the dog hair in the carpet. I did need a Meg's hair brush to remove that. The Carmen vacuumed things up nicely and provided steam to loosen stubborn soils. Some of the stains required the use of a great feature on the Dupray, heated detergent injection. All of the attachments have the ability to pump a detergent solution that is very hot into whatever you are working on. Following this up with the upholstery tool did a great job. As I am learning about the unit, I did try just steam for a while before injecting so in these pics the upholstery does have a bit of moisture still in it.

After steaming, the car looked much better, and I followed up with a odor treatment I offer as an extra to customers involving 1Z Klima Clean and Car Pro So2Pure. This vehicle took 4 hours to complete and as for time savings, I really couldn't say. Normally with cars of this caliber dirtiness, I have reached a point of not being able to clean deeply enough. There is simply too much soiling and deep-seated staining. At that point, I usually tell the customer that there was nothing more I could do and generally feel like a failure. The upside on this detail is that the Dupray allowed me to clear that hurdle and provide much deeper cleaning.

Before, stains all over the seats

After, stains steamed/extracted out, still drying

In action, it was a cold night, so the steam lingered a bit longer than usual

I thought this was a cool shot of the steam trails rising out of the car:headbang:

Driver seat close up

After steaming


Car#3: Suzuki Forenza
I wanted to highlight one particular area of this car to showcase the Carmen. As you can see from the pictures, the passenger footwell behind the driver was thrashed. Some sort of red lipstick or make-up stain was covering a large portion of the carpet. If you have fought against red staining, you know how stubborn it is. However, with the Dupray's detergent injection, steam and extraction capability, I cleaned the entire footwell area in 6 minutes. Normally, I estimate this would have taken 12-15 minutes and still not have removed all the staining.

The rest of this car was in bad shape, and took about 3 hours to clean. I estimate this would have taken another 45-60 minutes without the steamer.





Summary:
After a few weeks and roughly 10 car interiors cleaned with this machine, Here is what I like about the machine. I am most impressed with the results the Dupray machine gets me with such minimal elbow grease. 1 or 2 passes with the triangle brush and a MF towel pulls out more than I would get after a few rounds of scrubbing a panel with a brush and wiping down with a MF towel. Time savings overall has been great, probably averaging 25%.
The other huge plus of using this machine so far has to do with need for chemicals. My usual array of interior cleaning chemicals: Sprayaway glass cleaner, OPT PC in a few dilutions, Opti-Clean and OPT Leather Protectant. In the end, I did not use any glass cleaner, and just a bit of 3M GPAR on the Chevy. I used Opti-Clean in addition to steam for wiping down the door jamb areas, and enjoyed the steam loosening things up here before wiping it down. I did of course use a normal amount of OPT Leather Protectant for redressing leather and trim areas. But overall, the reduction in chemicals needed was huge! I usually go through 16-30 ounces of Power Clean on a given car and a fair amount of Sprayaway and other chemicals as well. Now if I need some extra cleaning power, I will use the detergent injection feature on the Dupray. Their Biovap degreaser is a very good cleaner and eco friendly as well. It is also concentrated and I have had good results using it at 10:1 so a gallon will last quite some time.
Another major positive of this unit is its overall cleaning power. As mentioned on the Chevy detail, sometimes you encounter soiling that just doesn't respond to convential methods of cleaning. The Carmen is in another league here with its high powered steam and heat. It has blown me away.

Here are some constructive criticisms for the machine. I say constructive because it is an outstanding machine that could become even better.
First, it is heavy, definitely be prepared to use proper lifting technique for getting it in and out of your work vehicle or house. It does roll around the floor just fine.
Also, I could save even more time if I wasn't switching between kits (non-vacuum and vacuum) and their hoses/attachments. For example, the triangle brush only works with the non-vac kit, so if I am vacuuming an area, and then need to use the triangle brush, I have to stop, switch hoses and start again. Also, I could really use a long horse hair vacuum attachment for working no sensitive areas.


Thanks for reading! Please feel free to post or PM any questions or comments.

 

Awesome piece of kit this looks like, and the results speak for themselves.

 

Impressive after pics.

 

I'm glad to hear you guys like the results!

 

...I would recommend subscribing to this thread as I will have some really nice before/after shots from some details lined up in the near future....

 

I also should add that you can get the Carmen in 110 or 220 volt configurations. Mine is a 110v since I am mobile and can't guarantee what type of electrical system a customer will have. The 220 volt is a bit more expensive, but you can run steam/vacuum at the same time with no loss of steam power. Don't get too excited about that though, for a car interior setting, most situations where I am steaming and vacuuming together I only need the medium setting on steam. Steam loss I have experienced when doing this is minor and doesn't happen immediately.

 

Hello Shane, can you clear your pm box.
Thanks

 

cleared, sorry about that!

 

Amazing results!

How are you liking it still?

 

Thanks.

The Carmen is now an integral part of my interior detailing arsenal. It is a fantastic machine that I am really happy with. One thing I have been using more and more of is the heated detergent injection function. Being able to soak a floor mat, section of carpeting or door card in hot detergent really loosens up the grime to the point that it will extract or wipe off with minimal effort.

 

By the way, My Metro Vac is officially for sale. It's the 4hp model, here is a pic. Probably only used it on 10-12 interiors before I got the Carmen. PM me if interested

 

by any chance, have you try the steamer on the exterior?

 

I haven't yet, sorry to not have any type of review for exteriors.

 

Metro Vac still for sale too!!!
$130 shipped. Its in great shape.
PM me if interested.

 

is the suction of the metro vac n blo the same as the carmen inox?